'The Tree of Life' -- 3 1/2 stars

'The Tree of Life' -- 3 1/2 stars

PG-13; 2:18 running time Call it outlandishly pompous, messy, whatever. I've seen it twice now, and though this childhood was not my childhood, and my spiritual yearnings are not Malick's, "The Tree of Life" already has come to mean a great deal to me. Malick's latest captures a series of glorious "found" moments between the brothers played by the young actors Hunter McCracken and Laramie Eppler. These are some of the truest fragments of a child's life, romanticized without being falsified, ever caught in an American film. -- Michael PhillipsRead the full review

PG-13; 2:18 running time Call it outlandishly pompous, messy, whatever. I've seen it twice now, and though this childhood was not my childhood, and my spiritual yearnings are not Malick's, "The Tree of Life" already has come to mean a great deal to me. Malick's latest captures a series of glorious "found" moments between the brothers played by the young actors Hunter McCracken and Laramie Eppler. These are some of the truest fragments of a child's life, romanticized without being falsified, ever caught in an American film. -- Michael PhillipsRead the full review

PG-13; 2:18 running time Call it outlandishly pompous, messy, whatever. I've seen it twice now, and though this childhood was not my childhood, and my spiritual yearnings are not Malick's, "The Tree of Life" already has come to mean a great deal to me. Malick's latest captures a series of glorious "found" moments between the brothers played by the young actors Hunter McCracken and Laramie Eppler. These are some of the truest fragments of a child's life, romanticized without being falsified, ever caught in an American film. -- Michael PhillipsRead the full review